Climate Survey @ Work...

[flatlander_48]

My employer has done Climate Surveys within the company for years. They are designed to get a sense of job satisfaction, how well diversity programs are working, why people hired in in the first place and why they might leave as well as other items of interest. The surveys are anonymous, but this one marks a first.

There is an LGBT employee affinity group within the company. It's not a large group (about 15 members currently) even though our total company employment is over 20,000. The group is made up of us Tribe members and allies. I've been a member for a bit over 4 years.

Anyway, due to the efforts of the group this survey is the first to include check boxes in the demographics section for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and separately, Transgender. I checked both as I consider myself Bisexual and Transgendered.

Although I checked the boxes quickly, I did pause for a time to think about what I had done. All the past concerns (by many people) of whether or not the surveys are truly anonymous came flooding back. However, I thought about the time in the past when I supervised a group of 11 engineers and technicians. I was convinced of the anonymity of the survey then and I had no real reason to doubt it in current times. I guess what it means is that even if you work to manage your fears, stuff pops up and you have to deal with it...

[Slip Affinity]

I wish the company I retired from had a survey like that. I would find it extremely interesting to see the stats.

[sterling12]

I would take The Survey at face value. I think they are probably sincere.

Why are they sincere? Well, in a Company with 20K employees, if they ever tried to use a tool like a survey, "to weed out the weirdo's," it could never be kept a secret. Somebody, somewhere, bound to tell.

Then, we are talking about Lawsuit Baby! Bad P.R., bad Karma in recruiting future employees, bad karma with their stockholders. Always the last thing they want, is a hassle....you know that. Also, if they did link the anonymous survey to you, and now they know you are Bisexual and TG, makes you just about untouchable. The Knowing, would now burden them with privacy issues and obligations.

Kind of nice to know that sometimes what's perceived as a negative, might just contain The Roots of Power!

By the way, if you are in Upper Management, they would know already! Before a person in a major Corp. makes that trip up to "Big Chief Country," they have done all kinds of Security Checks about their "Investment." I would be very surprised if I was TG and being considered for V.P. or something similar, if they didn't know what color panties I preferred.

All of this is opinion on my part, but "been there, done that." Bet I'm fairly close to knowing what's going on.

Peace and Love, Joanie

[flatlander_48]

I wish the company I retired from had a survey like that. I would find it extremely interesting to see the stats.

Usually folks are allowed to see the results. When I was a supervisor, I was charged with the task of interpreting the results for the larger department that we were attached to. The idea was to determine what we needed to work on as a department. It was fascinating how my interpretations differed from the manager that I reported to. I can't remember what the exact issue was, but it involved what seemed to be contradictory pieces of information. In general, engineers don't deal well with ambiguity. Fortunately, I seem to have less of that than most (fem side?). Anyway, when I pointed out another way to interpret this seemingly conflicting information, it was like a light bulb went off. Made me feel pretty good!

[flatlander_48]

I would take The Survey at face value. I think they are probably sincere.

Why are they sincere? Well, in a Company with 20K employees, if they ever tried to use a tool like a survey, "to weed out the weirdo's," it could never be kept a secret. Somebody, somewhere, bound to tell.

Then, we are talking about Lawsuit Baby! Bad P.R., bad Karma in recruiting future employees, bad karma with their stockholders. Always the last thing they want, is a hassle....you know that. Also, if they did link the anonymous survey to you, and now they know you are Bisexual and TG, makes you just about untouchable. The Knowing, would now burden them with privacy issues and obligations.

Kind of nice to know that sometimes what's perceived as a negative, might just contain The Roots of Power!

By the way, if you are in Upper Management, they would know already! Before a person in a major Corp. makes that trip up to "Big Chief Country," they have done all kinds of Security Checks about their "Investment." I would be very surprised if I was TG and being considered for V.P. or something similar, if they didn't know what color panties I preferred.

All of this is opinion on my part, but "been there, done that." Bet I'm fairly close to knowing what's going on.

Peace and Love, Joanie

Agreed. The thing that is interesting about the anonymity factor is that I have heard the SAME concerns come from women, white males, black people, LGBT, etc. It's like everybody has the same concerns because if they answer truthfully, they don't want a finger pointed at them by their supervisors and department managers. The surveyors are very careful to roll the data up to the next highest level if the sample size is to small. In other words, if you have a department of 15 people, 2 of which are women, then the statistics involving the responses from the women would get rolled up to the directorate level (which has several departments) and combined with others.

It just struck me as funny that in spite of the fact that I know all this, my personal reaction was "Gawd, what have I done??". Ain't Human Nature a B++ch?

[Toyah]

I really hate surveys they can be misinterpreted and take a huge amount of effort for very little gain

[flatlander_48]

I really hate surveys they can be misinterpreted and take a huge amount of effort for very little gain

Fortunately, as time goes on folks get smarter about doing these things. There are some online companies that (for a fee) will host the survey, work with you to formulate the questions, collect the data, prepare the reports and help you to understand it. The client never sees the raw data. This one in particular took less than 15 minutes. I understand what you mean about effort vs. gain. If the questions aren't structured properly or not answered honestly, the data you get back is likely worthless.